Abstract and Concrete Judgment

So, today I'm going to explain the differences between abstract and concrete judgment. Judging, as you may recall, for Jung refers to some sort of discriminating faculty. It is an overall approach to any situation in which one makes judgments. So, for example, if you take a bite of food and make a disgusted face, that's a feeling judgment, since an evaluation has been made. If you read an article in the newspaper and dispassionately reach a conclusion about what occurred, that is a judgment using thinking. These are things we all do, from the most trivial instance to the most major decision. However, some people are more oriented towards making judgments. Those are people whose dominant function is thinking or feeling. This is further refined by the nature of the judgments. If it is habitually more evaluative, then the person is a feeling type. If, however, one habitually brackets off their own values and pre-suppositions to reach a conclusion, the person is a thinking type. People for whom judgment is a secondary process are irrational types, which means rather than having a rational criteria (evaluation vs conclusion) through which to organize and make determinations about what they encounter, they focus on experiencing it, either in terms of a present-oriented faculty focused on the five senses, or a future oriented faculty focused on either inner or outer possibilities. These people tend to need to learn to develop their judgment, lest they be at the whim of their experiences. For the purposes of this post, I'll be talking about the rational functions (thinking and feeling) and only referring to the irrational functions (intuition and sensing) insofar as they refer to whether a judging faculty is abstract or concrete.

When a function is differentiated, it is abstract. That is, it is differentiated and operating in a way that is independent from other functions, where it is highly refined and efficient, able to work smoothly and separate irrelevant components from its key activities. Consider it analogous to writing an essay for an exam: when you write your essay in a manner that is clear, comprehensive, contains all the necessary details, but doesn't have any irrelevant points or "borrow" from unrelated themes, you can usually be sure that your professor will give you an "A." However, as your grasp of the material slips, more irrelevant details slip in, your topic gets combined with other topics, you may try to "shotgun" by incorporating anything that can be brought up into conscious recollection in the hopes that something hits. Well, an abstract function is like that "A" essay. By contrast, when a function operates in a concrete manner, it tends to combine with other functions. It "pads" its activity with tendencies from other functions in an effort to try to get the job done.

Concrete Feeling:

Concrete feeling tends to be caught up in the sensuous. When feeling is triggered, it is most commonly experienced as something that happens outside the self. For example, pulling off the road to see cliffs over the ocean and suddenly hit out of nowhere with this wave of emotion would be an example of concrete feeling. Another would be to watch a very moving play and have the experience of catharsis: one is overcome by emotion, tears come to their eyes, feeling is vulnerable, and the experience leaves a profound impact on the person. The sensuous experience of sitting on a rooftop in Malta, sipping a fine wine and eating a good dinner, warmed with all kinds of good feeling, would also be an example.

You may notice a similar thread in all of the above examples: the feeling experience is coupled with emotion and is involved in something sensory. Crying, for example, is a physiological response, which Jung is very clear on as being unrelated to feeling as a differentiated function. When feeling is well differentiated, the feeling values operate smoothly, and in a manner that is separate from emotional reactions.

Additionally, feeling precedes the encounters with the world when differentiated. The values selected or drawn upon are firmly in place and they precede the experience of the outer stimuli. The outer stimuli is therefore subordinated to the judging faculty, and it is only then that it is determined whether the experience is to be accepted or rejected. However, when feeling is concrete, it doesn't operate so efficiently. Rather than the value being in place and the world being judged in that way, these sensory phenomena (apprehension of something beautiful in nature, the satisfaction of a good meal) take on a sudden, mystical power that overpowers the person and fills them with emotion. When this happens, one can conclude that the feeling function most likely does not predominate and is not differentiated, as it is too bound up with sensory experiences.

Concrete feeling can be quite emotional, and can at times deteriorate into mere moodiness, which is different from the mood of the feeling type.

Abstract Feeling

Abstract feeling, on the other hand, is more efficient. Relying on a pre-existing criteria based on religious, moral, aesthetic and intellectual sentiment, it is able to operate smoothly without an emotional response. This isn't to say that the feeling type is never emotional--anyone can be--but the emotions are not tied up with the evaluations. So, for example, the same play as mentioned before will be first evaluated in terms of how it accords with the values and insofar as it is consistent with those values, it is determined to be good or bad. Remember, values means something much broader than the colloquial definition: if my value is that a "good play" follows the formula presented in Aristotle's Poetics, and I then judge the play on those grounds, that would mean judging it in accordance with my values. A rational (but not logical) determination is then made. Similarly, if nature is valued by the person, then these things may be concluded to be good, and then accepted by the individual, but if some other pre-set criteria intervenes (such as determining nature to be something that takes the person away from all the refinement and culture she enjoys, and not in accord with her values) the person may conclude she would rather be in Paris and express dissatisfaction with the current environment.

This brings me to an important point. Jung says that abstract feeling covers religious, moral, intellectual and aesthetic sentiments. Now, there is nothing to say what form these take. They will follow a rational pattern for the individual, so, if the feeling type has a value, their analysis will conform to that value. For example, suppose I hold the value that art should in some way express something of the human condition. My aesthetic experience will be predicated on the art doing this. If I go to MoMA and see an exhibit of inflatable chairs, not only will I be left cold, but I will determine this to be bad art. However, that doesn't mean that my values will remain static. It might be that I, at 39, have values that exclude the inflatable chair. Perhaps at 19, though, due to other intersecting beliefs or the values of my social group, I thought the idea of inflatable chairs as art was deeply profound (thankfully, that was never the case) I might have made a different determination then. That doesn't mean it isn't rational: an evaluative principle can change over time, as things touch upon these abstract ideas and impress upon them the need for certain values to be modified, altered or adapted.

Religious conversions often are of this character. I don't mean the sort of deathbed religious conversion often found among extraverted thinking types with inferior introverted feeling, but rather when some sort of crisis of faith or social value leads one from one religion to another. Religious values can be of any sort: Christian, Muslim, Pagan, Hindu, Buddhist, etc. Even atheism, when infused with all sorts of evaluations about the worth of Christianity, behavior of the Catholic church, and not based solely on the logical arguments, falls under the domain of the feeling function. One example would be the person who is raised as a Christian but, when away at college, discovers Zen Buddhism, and where they once made judgments based on a thing's congruence with Christian values, they now have Buddhist values as their means of making determinations. Now, in our contemporary society, the feeling function gets a bad rap for its religious inclinations: words such as "fanaticism" and "dogmatism" get bandied about. However, that sort of extreme reaction tends to be more the domain of inferior feeling, which has not learned how to "handle" its faith experience, and gets so bound up in emotions it feels compelled to then force it upon others. When operating well, it simply is a system through which one can evaluate where the person stands in relation to the things it encounters.

Feeling function, when abstract, elevates above moodiness and becomes a sort of "mood" a general tone or "vibe" of a place, epoch, or society. Rather than being personal and self-absorbed in its moodiness (as is the case with concrete) it taps into something which has a more universal quality.

Concrete Thinking:

Concrete thinking, just like concrete feeling, has a relative inefficiency to it and tends to be bound up in sensation. When concrete thinking is connected to sensation, it becomes slavish to facts. One example of this slavish thinking: the Psychology major who likes to quote statistics, without being able to say anything critical or insightful about the research in question. Another example would be the academic that over-relies on quoted material, while being reticent to declare one's own position or interpretation.

More concrete numerical operations would fall into this category as well. Jung was rather critical of the idea that mathematics could be considered part of logic, and in his essays he says that while it makes use of logic and that it is a separate faculty altogether. In The Gifted Child, he states,

While I am on this subject I must not omit to point out that very erroneous views used to be held at one time concerning the gift for mathematics. It was believed that the capacity for logical and abstract thought was, so to speak, incarnate in mathematics and that this was therefore the best discipline if one wanted to think logically. But the mathematical gift, like the musical gift to which it is biologically related, is identical neither with logic nor with intellect, although it makes use of them just as all philosophy and science do. One can be musical without possessing a scrap of intellect, and in the same way astounding feats of calculation can be performed by imbeciles. Mathematical sense can be inculcated as little as can musical sense, for it is a specific sense. (239)

Higher mathematics is akin to musical ability, though at the lower levels I would assert that it falls under the domain of concrete thinking due to its reliance on sensation. It becomes like the mathematics of the accountant: precise, detail-oriented, a numerical "fact" of sorts that is neither related to the abstract thinking in logic nor the kind of gift or talent required in higher mathematics.

Abstract Thinking:
Perhaps it's because this is the easiest for me to understand, but it doesn't seem like there's much to say on the matter. Like the negative theologian who defines God by what he is not, my explanation of what abstract thinking is not seems to illuminate what it would be to the point where I think I'd just be (over)stating the obvious here. Still, I'll say a few words on in in the event that it isn't as obvious as I think it is.

Abstract thinking, of course, is going to be efficient, focused thinking which doesn't get caught up in extraneous details. At the risk of being too self-referential, consider the following analogy: at the start of this summer, I decided I wanted to figure out what the key features of Jung's system of psychological types were. I read Psychological Types, and some key sections I read over more than a few times. I also read Von Franz and Hillman. Where things seemed baffling or contradictory, I looked at some of Jung's other works (ranging from dreams and archetypes to educational methods) to get a picture of his overall project. From there, I parsed out what the key features were and wrote various notes and drew various diagrams to get to the essence of the system. Well, that's pretty much what abstract thinking does: it takes the wealth of information and logically organizes it, slicing out what is unnecessary to form categories and draw conclusions.

Now, abstract thinking doesn't mean that someone who has differentiated thinking necessarily creates great intellectual works. There may be variabilities in terms of ability which are distinct from the role it plays in the personality. Just as a person can be highly intelligent but simply have some other function hold dominance, a person can have thinking more differentiated than the other functions but not utilize it to its fullest capability for whatever reason (background, opportunity, life choice etc). What indicates abstract thinking is that the person predominantly has this efficient use and habitually employs it when making judgments.

In Conclusion: So, you have what should be a fairly detailed picture of what each of the two judging functions look like when either abstract or concrete. The examples I gave should be taken as exemplar situations. The effects of concrete thinking and feeling may be much more subtle than is depicted here. Since there are degrees of development of the functions, the placement will influence how clearly concrete or abstract a function is. A very differentiated dominant function will look fairly abstract, similarly the inferior function will tend to be quite obviously concrete, but the middle functions may be less obvious, and may even have traits, to varying degrees, of both the abstract and concrete aspects of that function.

This is my last week before the semester starts. I may try to get a couple more posts in, if I'm feeling inspired. Or I might get my last bit of leisure reading in. I'll probably be writing more sporadically after that, since I'm going to be crazy busy this term.

Jungian Functions and the Fine Arts

So, I'm acutely aware of summer rapidly approaching its end. In just over two weeks, my teaching appointment for the semester begins, and a week after that, I'll be teaching two undergraduate philosophy classes, as well as taking two graduate text seminars. I have a few ideas I've been tossing around, so hopefully I get them all done. Once the semester starts, my posting may slow down again. I'll probably focus on my personal(ish) blog when the time allows. (When being the operative term.)

In the meantime, here's something quick(ish) that I've been tossing around for awhile.

There are certain associations people make about Jung's types and the arts. One of the myths I've seen most frequently is that artistic production belongs to the realm of the feeling types. In actuality, all of the types have some contribution to the arts, but the different functions have different areas of mastery.


Intuition: Jung is quite clear in Psychological Types that intuition represents artistic inspiration. This is the sort of "aha!" that comes in, where one has a sudden inspiration or idea. This makes no claim to the ability. The person could be a tormented genius like Blake, or they could be that guy who sits around in a cafe, writing really bad poetry that everyone secretly wishes he won't ask them to read. There is something very unstructured about this. It is pure inspiration, what the ancient Greeks often referred to as divine madness. If you would like to get an idea of what this looks like, go read Plato's Ion on this website. It's one of Plato's shorter dialogues, and the section on divine inspiration gives you a good idea of this process.

Sensing: Sensing is the function most associated with artistic production. It's the sensing type who can do really detailed, realistic drawings, paintings and sculptures. In contrast to intuition, which has inspiration but can often lack technique, sensing types are skilled with technique, but may have trouble with the risk taking and imaginative leaps that the intuitive type is so comfortable with. As you can imagine, both are essential to artistic creation, and either in the extreme could result in artistic failure: the intuitive type fails on account of being pure idea with no way of communicating it, while the sensing type fails by doing technically proficient works that are nonetheless uninspired. This exemplifies the need for both types to become integrated with the inferior function. When the sensing type becomes more integrated, she's able to be more courageous in her work, while the intuitive type who engages her inferior sensing is able to finally master the technique necessary to make her inner vision comprehensible to others.

Thinking: Thinking is what gets us theory. In the extraverted thinking type, this lends itself (as von Franz points out) to the art historian who situates the work of art in a movement. It's extraverted thinking that determines what sort of art is thought to belong in a museum, what school it belongs to and what year a certain work was likely created. By contrast, introverted thinking type asks questions about what a work of art is, what sort of criteria we ought to have to determine both what qualifies as a work of art and how one ought to conclude whether or not a work of art is "good." The introverted thinking type might, for example, look at The Museum of Bad Art's website, and say, "Well, wait a minute, what sort of criteria are you using to determine 'bad art?' What do you mean by 'bad,' for that matter, what do you mean by 'art?'"

Feeling: The feeling function would most properly belong to the MOBA site referenced above. The feeling type rules neither artistic production nor artistic inspiration, but rather rules the judgments made about art. This is not the same as an intellectual process used to determine how art relates to a concept or to the data, but rather, a pre-set criteria through which the art is deemed good or bad. For the extraverted feeling type, this will refer to social norms. How art fits the current standard will be the criteria. For example, the extraverted feeling type might look at the latest trends in the art world as shown by a magazine like Art Forum and, when viewing a work of art, determines whether or not it ought to be viewed in a respectable museum. The introverted feeling type's aesthetic judgment will be keen as well, but will be based on some sort of internal criteria which is hard to articulate, and will simply be experienced as a moving experience. Edvard Munch's The Scream is deemed a beautiful work of art because it is very moving, the person relates to it or because they had some sort of aesthetic experience while viewing it that is difficult to articulate and even harder to pin down.

Again, both of these are rather one-sided. The philosopher of art who has never had an aesthetic experience won't be able to say anything meaningful about the work itself. She may try to concoct a logical proof for determining a work of art's worth, which, to the feeling type, will seem to miss the point entirely. By contrast, the feeling type without considering either the history of the work or the philosophical questions behind it gets reduced to the "I don't know a lot about art but I know what I like" stereotype. She may seem at best to subordinate the work to her own pre-existing expectations and at worst will only mimic the views of others. Each function has to engage with its opposite to really have any sort of insight into the artwork.

From here, you can piece together the likely approaches from the combining of the dominant and auxiliary. Remember that the dominant will be the most prominent. The auxiliary serves the aims of the dominant only loosely and until deliberate efforts or circumstances push the auxiliary to fully differentiate, it will usually be more toned down. (Some people, though, have both so well developed that it can be hard to determine which their dominant function really is.) This probably shouldn't be used to type others, since Jung considered that to be not only difficult but contrary to the system's intent. (Most Jungian analysts suggest he would have been against the use of personality inventories too, and that the only way to really learn your type is to live with the system for a long time. Not to say you can't use them if you find them helpful, but even MBTI practitioners urge just using it as a starting point and that ultimately you, not the test, are the best judge of your type.)

However, where the aesthetic approaches may be helpful is in getting a deeper understanding of what each of the functions does. In that sense, it can help with self-typing. Also, as so much of Jung's system was developed through examining the type problem in philosophy, literature and the arts, I believe the approach to aesthetic issues to be yet another useful avenue in finding one's own type. Examining one's approach to the arts in light of this may reveal important information about the self which can then be used as a starting point for further self-exploration.